Animal Welfare Amendment Bill

It is a pleasure to speak during the second reading debate on the Animal Welfare Amendment Bill. This bill improves the structures and, therefore, the enforcement of laws on the ill-treatment of animals. Essentially, this bill is designed to bridge a gap in legislation that resulted in a marked number of animal welfare cases being downgraded to ill-treatment of an animal when far more serious crimes had been committed.

Section 28A, “Reckless ill-treatment of animals”, in clause 5, comes into play between the top offence, defined in section 28, “wilful ill-treatment of animals”, and the lower offence of just ill-treatment of an animal. The Primary Production Committee agreed that adding this tool to the offences against animals would result in more successful prosecutions of such offences. That having been said, I must congratulate the Minister of Agriculture, David Carter, for two reasons: having the wisdom to reprioritise the funding within the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry’s budget to reinforce the number of animal welfare officers, and to strengthen the protection of our domestic animals and farm animals.

So what does the bill do? It introduces an important category within the Animal Welfare Act, one that will result in more successful prosecutions for the ill-treatment of animals.

Finally, I congratulate the Minister of Agriculture, David Carter, on having the wisdom to make $8.2 million available within the Budget for better animal welfare care. I commend this bill to the House.

There was movement at the station, for the word had passed around

That the colt from old Regret had got away,

And had joined the wild bush horses—he was worth a thousand pound,

So all the cracks had gathered to the fray.

All the tried and noted riders from the stations near and far

Had mustered at the homestead overnight,

For the bushmen love hard riding where the wild bush horses are,

And the stock-horse snuffs the battle with delight.

We all recognise that poem by “Banjo” Paterson, set in the Australian outback: “The Man from Snowy River”. It illustrates with beauty and elegant simplicity how the early development of Australia was driven by the ineluctable working linkage between man and animals. In the early days, the Australian economy was based largely on selling wool from the backs of sheep. Those sheep were managed by men on horses with working dogs.

💬 Hone Harawira: This is New Zealand, Cam.

In New Zealand a similar relationship held true. The working partnership is continued in both countries to this day. Meat and dairy exports underpin our tradable sector.

Away from the farm, the majority of New Zealand homes nurture one or more domestic pets. These pets provide company and affection to people of all ages; they are part of our everyday life.

Most Kiwis look after their animals extremely well; sadly, a small number do not. Very simply, we believe that New Zealanders abhor animal cruelty and National, in this bill, is doing something about it. Thank you.

I am very pleased to take a call on the Animal Welfare Amendment Bill. This came before the Primary Production Committee and was a member’s bill, but it has been adopted by the Government. I commend the Government for doing that, because I do not think there is much that New Zealanders abhor more than cruelty to animals.

This bill follows on from a number of high-profile cases that have seen appalling cruelty to animals—

💬 Hone Harawira: Cruelty to children, cruelty to women?

Yes, cruelty to animals. I am not supporting cruelty to humans either, but we are dealing with animals in this particular bill. We had a number of appalling cases, which saw such things as a drunken man taking the head off a family kitten in front of his family. We also had the awful instance of a man feeding five kittens to his pit bull terrier, and watching the animal while it killed them.

That sort of treatment of animals is reprehensible, and the fines and measures available to the courts are not of sufficient quantity or size to provide a deterrent message, not just to people who engage in wilful ill-treatment but also to those who recklessly ill-treat animals. A new offence is added via the bill in respect of reckless ill-treatment. There is a definition around wilful ill-treatment currently in the law for those who have set out deliberately to ill-treat or maim an animal. But there is an issue around reckless ill-treatment whereby, effectively, animals are abandoned—left without food, and left without shelter—by people who do not give a stuff about the animals for which they supposedly have care and responsibility. That is why as well as increasing the penalties for wilful ill-treatment, this bill introduces penalties for neglect and ill-treatment, which in the past have not been subject to such penalties.

The bill also enables the courts to order the forfeiture of animals owned by someone who has been convicted of a serious offence against an animal. In the select committee deliberation we also recommended that anybody who takes back animals or starts to look after animals again, when they have been subject to a penalty and a disqualification relating to the ownership of animals, can then face the same penalty all over again for taking on animals after that person has been told that he or she is not allowed to do that.

As mentioned, the bill was subject to considerable submissions from animal welfare agencies—the SPCA, amongst a number of others. One of the more curious submissions came from the New Zealand Pork Industry Board. I had to say to the representative of the board that I found it a little bizarre for that industry to be submitting in support of the bill, given that in the eyes of many New Zealanders the pork industry is an industry that raises a number of questions regarding its approach to animal welfare. For the Pork Industry Board to say it was shocked by some of the incidents of animal cruelty that it had seen reported was a little strange, given that for many New Zealanders the issue of animal welfare was most brought into highlight by the Sunday documentary last year in relation to the continued retention of sows in sow crates. So that was a rather odd submission to be made. None the less there were a number of other submissions.

Debate interrupted.

The House adjourned at 10 p.m.